Karen Marshall, co-author of the Get Set! Piano series and How to Teach Instrumental and Singing Lessons – 100 Inspiring Ideas, shares her advice for encouraging children to teach themselves daily through musical games in the playground.
Spreading a musical virus
Every Wednesday I work at a Primary school – teaching reception right through to Year 6 across one day. From ‘Big Sing’ assemblies, Kodàly lessons to whole class ensemble teaching, the day is hugely varied. The children at this school are lucky to have a music specialist teaching them but I’m aware that they don’t get daily music lessons. Because of this I have developed something to enable the children to ‘teach themselves’ daily through playground music games. I call this our school ‘musical virus’.
How does it work?
-
I teach a song with actions to one class in their weekly music lesson.
-
The children are instructed to teach the song to everyone they can at play time.
-
The following week I check across the other classes who now knows the song, reporting back to the children how well they’ve done at ‘spreading the musical virus.’
-
I then set another class the task of spreading a musical virus – and so it goes on!
In reality I think un-named musical viruses have been spreading around our playgrounds for years. The clapping and circle games I remember with such fondness from my own childhood I believe have played a valuable role in my music education. I believe as music teachers, teaching the next generation, we can bring much musical happiness to children at playtime for many years to come.
Some popular songs to use:
-
Hi lo Chicka lo
-
Double double this this
-
This is Concentration
-
A Sailor went to sea, sea, sea
-
One potato, two potato
-
The Cup song
Karen Marshall is a practicing private and peripatetic teacher in York with students from five to seventy-one years of age. Karen specialises in multi-sensory music teaching and is a Kodály practitioner. A member of the British Dyslexia Association’s music committee, Karen has trained teachers across the UK on teaching students with Special Educational needs. She writes for Music Teacher Magazine, was a piano and pedagogue student of the late Christine Brown and works voluntarily to support music education at her local Primary and Secondary school. She is also the co-author of the Get Set! Piano series and How to Teach Instrumental & Singing Lessons: 100 Inspiring Ideas.